“All Americans should be able to recognize the denominations of paper currency,” Stark said in a news release. “But current bills are identical in size, which prevents millions of blind and visually impaired people from fully participating in our economy.”

Of more than 180 countries that issue their own banknotes, only the United States prints identical bills for every denomination. A federal judge found in November 2006 that the Treasury Department had violated the Rehabilitation Act by issuing paper currency that visually impaired individuals could not readily distinguish; the court ordered the government to make paper currency recognizable to the blind through the use of distinguishing tactile marks, a decision the Treasury Department is appealing.

Stark’s bill is named after Catherine Skivers of Hayward, a Stark constituent who is the California Council of the Blind‘s immediate past president and current legislative committee chairwoman. She told me today she’s thrilled to have her name on the bill, “especially on such an important issue. … We really need this currency so we know what we have. I’m just so thankful to Pete Stark for doing it.”

The bill requires the U.S. Treasury to trim the corners of all bills in a manner that prevents fraud, with lower value bills having more corners trimmed. See examples after the jump.

The bill calls for the trimming of four corners on the $1 bill, three corners on the $2 bill, two diagonal corners on the $5 bill, two corners on a long side of the $10 bill, two corners on a short side of the $20 bill, one corner on the $50 bill, and no corners on the $100 bill.